Words of Comfort and Encouragement

14You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. 15Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. 16In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.

Matthew 5:14-16 (ESV)

I hope this blog will be a light on your spiritual path through life, and that God will speak through these posts to comfort you, encourage you, guide you.

Light is kind of the theme of my blog, so this is a great challenge for me!

As a follower of Christ, Jesus is the light of my life. He is the source of light that breaks through the darkness of the world. The words below from Jesus tell how we, as Christians, should act to demonstrate this light to others.

14You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. 15Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. 16In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.

Well, better late than never, right? I hope so anyway! Here’s my entry:

These photos were taken from just off the Bow Valley Parkway in Banff National Park, Canada, in the fall of 2009. I liked the flowers and was just playing around with the focus, as you can see. Then a bee happened to land on one of the flowers and I thought it made for a good photo!

This is Joseph in Egypt talking to his brothers after their father died. His brothers were afraid Joseph would try to get revenge on them for selling him into slavery many years before. You can read the story of Joseph beginning in Genesis 37 and continuing in chapter 39 to the end in chapter 50.

This is one of my favorite Bible stories because it has given me hope that God can take difficult circumstances and turn them around and use them for good!

Mother’s father worked as a carpenter. On this particular day, he was building some crates for
the clothes his church was sending to some orphanage in China. On his way home, he reached into his shirt pocket to find his glasses, but they were gone. When he mentally replayed his earlier actions, he realized what happened; the glasses had slipped out of his pocket unnoticed and fallen into one of the crates, which he had nailed shut. His brand new glasses were heading for China!

The Great Depression was at it’s height and Grandpa had six children. He had spent $20 for those glasses that very morning. He was upset by the thought of having to buy another pair. “It’s not fair,” he told God as he drove home in frustration. “I’ve been very faithful in giving of my time and money to your work, and now this.”

Yeah, my first blog request! Thanks to Bubu for asking about photos of the midnight sun in Iceland in the comments to his post about Iceland. I’m not honestly sure how midnight sun is defined, so I hope this qualifies! When we were there at the end of May, the sun set about 11:30 pm and rose at about 3:30 am. However, it never really got dark as you can kind of see from the last photo. Pretty cool, but remember the opposite is true in the winter!

This photo was taken in Reykjavik about 9:35 pm.

This photo of Skógafoss Waterfall was taken at 10:20 pm.

This photo was taken a few km north of Reykjavik at 12:40 am. So although you can’t actually see the sun, it’s still light out.

I was really happy to get this request for a post topic. Let me know in a comment if you have any requests for future posts!

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Video of Naghmeh Abedini speaking about the imprisonment of her husband Saeed Abedini at the UN Human Rights Council. Saeed Abedini is an American pastor who is imprisoned in Iran for his Christian faith. Even at this difficult time, she gives a beautiful summary of the gospel.

She says Iran has kept Saeed imprisioned “because Saeed believes in forgiveness of sin through Jesus Christ and that whoever accepts this forgiveness of sin can be reconciled to the God of peace and love. This is the God of peace we are all searching for.”

Here are some cool signs I found in Iceland. I think they’re cool because of the Icelandic language. Icelandic is a Scandinavian language, related to Norwegian, Swedish, and Danish. Icelandic has preserved some features no longer found in those languages. I honestly have no idea what these signs mean…I will try to find out! If you know, please let me know with a comment :-)

This first one was on a hiking trail near the guesthouse where we stayed.

My husband took these, I think just because he liked the long words in Icelandic :-)

As I watch the news and hear of all the things that are going on in Oklahoma my heart hurts. Oklahoma has become apart of me and I have become attached. The reason for that is because myself and twelve members of my amazing church, left Sunday May 26th with 5 vehicles. Including two twenty four foot budget trucks filled with supplies driving 26 hours straight to drop off for relief and to pray with those who were affected. We all were touched by those we encountered and the stories we heard. We left there Wednesday morning after dropping off supplies only to hear about the devastation that took place last night.

As I began to pray God reminded me that he is a comforter and that he cares for Oklahoma and us even during our worse moments. Here is God reminder to all of us. 1-Peter 5:6-7- Humble yourselves…